Dear Colleagues,
We’re writing to tell you about our campaign to improve working conditions for non-tenure track faculty (NTT Faculty) at LMU.
NTT Faculty do most of the teaching at LMU. Yet we endure short-term contracts, job insecurity, and minimal opportunities to advance at the university. What is more, our wages make it difficult to survive in one of the most expensive regions in the United States—so many of us take other jobs to make ends meet. And we lack access to the time and funds that are necessary for completing our research and other academic work that helps us grow in our professions. Many of us have given years—sometimes decades—of service under these conditions. No worker should live with this precarity, and all educators should have the chance to grow.
Our working conditions affect our students, too, by limiting what we can realistically do to educate and support them. Faculty working conditions are student learning conditions.
There is a path forward. We are forming a union to gain job security, living wages, and the rights and protections that we deserve. We are forming a union to better serve our students, our institution, and our families.
Our campaign is part of a national movement. NTT Faculty at other institutions, including Occidental College, Whittier College, Georgetown University, and Fordham University, have seen major gains by forming unions. They have achieved significant pay increases, improved job security, advancement opportunities, a more effective role in shared governance, and more.
The time is now for LMU NTT Faculty to join together in a movement to better our working conditions and change the course of higher education at LMU. Soon you may be approached by a NTT Faculty colleague or an organizer with SEIU 721, the union with whom we are partnering. We urge you to meet with us, ask questions, and join our movement!
For more information about our campaign:
- email us at lmunifiedfaculty@gmail.com
- visit our website at https://www.seiu721.org/loyola-marymount-university-union.php
Ready to join us in forming a NTT Faculty union at LMU?
Please sign a union authorization card. You can sign a digital card (using a non-LMU email address and phone number) at https://www.seiu721.org/lmu-union-authorization-card.php (or find it at the bottom of this letter) or email us if you would prefer to sign a paper card. Please note: LMU will not know who signed union authorization cards; they go directly to the union and will only be shared with the National Labor Relations Board.
We have different titles — Lecturer, Senior Lecturer, Instructor, Senior Instructor, Clinical Faculty, Visiting Faculty, Field Work Instructor, Postdoctoral Instructor, and more — but we have common goals. We all endeavor to advance our respective fields, improve how we prepare and mentor the next generation of leaders in academia and beyond, and create a strong campus community built on learning and service.
We call on LMU leaders to create a university that lives up to its Jesuit values, respects worker rights and dignity, and recognizes and accepts the union that a majority of non-tenure track faculty want—without resistance, interference, or retaliation against faculty for their legally protected labor activity.
In the coming days, we will invite other LMU community members, including tenure track faculty, students, families, administrators, staff, and faith communities, to join our movement. These parties are also concerned about the direction of our university. We have seen teaching and learning starved of investment, while expenses have ballooned for administration, fundraising, construction, building upgrades, campus amenities, and other projects and activities that do not center instruction, education, mentoring, and service—the core aspects of LMU’s mission. Furthermore, as our student population has risen, our administration has increased its reliance on low wage, low security, non-tenure track positions. Yet, despite these poor conditions, we in the contingent faculty are united by our dedication to the mission that this university was founded on. Together we can reform higher education across the nation, beginning with LMU. We hope you will join us.
Very Best,
Your Colleagues
LMU NTT Faculty Organizing Committee to join SEIU 721
- Mark Anderson, BCLA
- Iris Blake, BCLA
- Diarmuid Breathnach, BCLA
- Jordan Christopher, BCLA
- Lauren Cole, BCLA
- Molly Corey, CFA
- Tashara Gavin-Moorehead, CFA
- Mark Gaynor, BCLA
- Chris Gipson, BCLA
- Maureen Gonzales, CFA
- Arik Greenberg, BCLA
- Laura Huffman, BCLA
- Abishek Jain, BCLA
- Andrew Johnson, BCLA
- Nirinjin Khalsa, BCLA
- David Kovacs, BCLA
- Darnise C. Martin, BCLA
- Eric Martin, BCLA
- Jessica Martinez-Tebbel, BCLA
- William McClain, BCLA
- Brian Moss, CFA
- Darrin Murray, CFA
- Rik Noyce, CFA
- Elizabeth Quinn, SFTV
- Hannah Sawyerr, BCLA
- Austin Schutz, BCLA
- Lauren Smart, BCLA
- Selwa Sweiden, CFA
- Rachel Waterstradt, BCLA
- Bryan Wisch, BCLA
- Alex Zambrano, BCLA
LMU Digital Authorization Card